Media content such as movies or live television may be streamed over a network, such as the Internet, to a media device. In some cases, the large amounts of data associated with media content, such as a movie, may make it impractical to transmit the content in its entirety to the media device prior to commencing playback. In other cases, such as a live broadcast, the entirety of the content may not be available when viewing commences.
Streaming of the media content may be interrupted due to a variety of possible technical factors. In some cases, conditions such as network congestion may cause delivery of the content to fail. In other cases, the media server might be overloaded and fall behind in transmitting content to the media device. Accordingly, in order to provide continuous playback, content may be transmitted from the media server and cached on the device prior to play back. Typically, the contents of the cache are maintained such that the cache includes content sufficient for several seconds of playback beyond the current playback location so that, in the event that the stream is disrupted, playback can continue uninterrupted using the contents of the cache. Existing systems and methods for maintaining cached content are lacking. These and other needs are presented and addressed in the present disclosure.